


Baby Sitting

by lha



Series: Gabriel Lorca: Child-whisperer [2]
Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Children, Date Night, Fluff and Angst, Gen, M/M, Medical, Paternal Lorca, Poor Self Care, Sickfic, Toddler, kasseelian opera
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-02
Updated: 2018-03-02
Packaged: 2019-03-25 19:57:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13841910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lha/pseuds/lha
Summary: Not directly inspired by a tweet but from the same universe -Gabriel steps into the breach but things don't really go as planned.





	Baby Sitting

**Author's Note:**

> This is set after Holding the Baby and the girls are now about 20 months and 6 years.

“Thank you again for agreeing to do this,” Paul said as he pulled on his coat, “and congratulations.”

“Yes, congratulations!” Hugh said as he came down the stairs, pausing to press a friendly kiss to Gabriel’s cheek, “I’m sorry we haven’t had a chance to properly mark the occasion.”

“It’s a promotion gentlemen not a peace treaty with the Romulans,” he pointed out. “I’m sorry I was late but shouldn’t you be getting going?”

“No apologies necessary, you’re the lifesaver. I can’t believe Tilly got stuck on Mars tonight of all…”

“Hugh,” Paul chided and the doctor shook his head and moved on.

“Right, they’re both asleep. I think Jess is coming down with a cold but I’m keen for her immune system to fight it off itself.” 

“You know where the kitchen is, now come on or we’re going to miss the opening act…” Paul said holding his husband’s coat out and all but chiveying him in the direction of the door. “Thank you, Gabriel.”

“Enjoy!” he called after them before allowing the door to slide closed. Once it had, Gabriel allowed himself to relax or more accurately collapse against the wall behind him. It had been a very long day, a long week really. Ever since he’d been called in, given an extra pip and handed the mess his predecessor had made of the logistical oversight of tactical reserves and deployments.

Allowing himself a moment just to breath, he closed his eyes and listed to the sound of the unfamiliar home. Then pushing himself upright he made his way into the sitting room with the stack of PADDs he’d grabbed off his desk. When he’d had the call from Paul, he hadn’t had the heart to say no. It was their anniversary and there was Kasseelian opera being performed at the Met and it turned out that Gabriel wasn’t as good at saying no as he thought he was. He hadn’t really been free, he didn’t really have time but it was fine. The children would sleep and he’d work here instead of the office and it would be fine. 

He was so engrossed in trying to tally up the inventory of the starbase stores he’d requested with the official records of what should have been, that it took him a moment for him to register the quiet crying. The house was obviously set up with an audio relay from the children’s bedrooms, so the snuffling and crying felt much closer than in fact it was. Climbing the stairs with a vague sense of foreboding, Gabriel was not particularly surprised to find Jess standing up in her crib and looking very sorry for herself. 

“Cap’in,” she whined holding her arms up and Gabriel reached down to pick her up.

“Hello there Jess, easy now,” he urged as she hiccupped and sobbed into his shoulder. Her small body was warm, and not just sleepy warm but too warm. “Shush,” he said, bouncing her gently and moving over to the changing table, swinging closed the door with his foot in the hope that they wouldn’t wake up Daisy down the hall. Laying Jess down, he used one hand to not hold her as much as sense that she wasn’t going anywhere while searching the shelf for… ah the ever present medical scanner. 

She was certainly running a temperature but at 37.3 degrees she wasn’t in any immediate danger. There was a small dispenser in the corner and he used it to fill a container with lukewarm water. 

“Shhh, I know… you’re feeling rotten aren’t you? This will help though.” Unfastening her sleepsuit, Gabriel stripped her down to nappy and finding a cloth from a nearby shelf, wet it and started running it over the rosey skin. He wasn’t an expert by any stretch, but he did know that while modern medicine could cure most things, it had become important to allow a child’s immune system to learn to fight things for itself. “Is that better, love? Hmm?” he asked mostly for something to say, than anything else. 

“Daddy?” she asked after a moment all big eyes and snotty nose.

“He’s not here just now, but it’s ok, we’re going to get you feeling better and then you can sleep and he and your Pappa will be back before you know it.” 

“Cap’in?” she said quietly arms raised again. 

“Come here then,” he said, picking her up again.

He walked the room, humming gently and talking to her, checking her temperature regularly and repeating the process if wiping her down every time that it started to climb again. Gabriel thought about trying to get in touch with Hugh and Paul but he didn’t want to interrupt their evening. The third or fourth time around the cycle, her temperature started climbing again after a shorter period and Gabriel decided that it was time to call in backup. He was about to try and raise Katrina, when all of a sudden Jess’s listless form stiffened in his arms and she started to shake.

“Jess?” he asked automatically, before muttering, “shit,” under his breath as he realised that there was something seriously wrong. Given his occupation, Gabriel was not unfamiliar with the adrenalin rush of crisis and he was a steady and calm on a bridge in the heat of battle as anyone, but this felt different. 

It wasn’t long before his training kicked in though; he shifted her as carefully as he could given the way she was arching against him now, so that she was facing away from him, and with an arm running along her torso he could hold her head at an angle to make sure she wouldn’t choke with his hand. He opened the door and crossed the corridor quickly,

“Daisy?” he called crisply, sticking his head into the six year-old’s bedroom, “Daisy?” She rolled over and blinked at him owlishly. “I need you to get up and come downstairs with me now, as quickly as you can. Can you do that for me Daisy?”

“Comin’ Captain,” she said, pushing back the covers. He didn’t wait for her, turning and descending the stairs as fast as he safely could all the while hyper aware of the twitching form against his chest.

The comm unit in the office seemed miles away, though he knew it could only have been a matter of seconds before he got their. 

“This is Admiral Lorca, I need an emergency medical beam out of three people from this location.” As he finished, Daisy crept in the door, her face marred by fear but when he held out a hand toward her she came without delay. Gabriel held her close to his side as they were captured by the transporter beam.

It wasn’t until someone had taken Jess away from him and someone else had asked him about what had happened and where Paul and Hugh could be found and then they’d been shown to the waiting room, that he realised that Daisy was still clinging to his hand in nothing but her pyjamas, silent tears pouring down her face. 

“Hey,” he said, crouching down in front of her, “thank you for being so brave and doing exactly what I asked.”

“Is… is Jess going to be ok?” she asked quietly.

“I’m not sure but she’s in the right place and there are lots of people who are going to help her. Ok?” She nodded, chewing her lip. “Here,” he said, taking off his jacket and wrapping it around her shoulders, “let’s sit down and they’ll let us know as soon as we can go and see her.”

Gabriel couldn’t be sure how long they sat there. Daisy curled up next to him and he stroked her hair and stared at the wall in front of him hoping against hope that Jess would be alright and trying to imagine what it wa he could say to her parents. 

“Papa?” Daisy asked, waking Gabriel from his introspection. 

“Hey there Daisy-chain,” Paul said gently. He had the classic Stamets closed expression, but he was carrying Jess. Gabriel stood up abruptly and then suddenly realised that maybe that hadn’t been a good idea as his vision tunnelled into pinpoints. 

“Woah.” There were hands on him, and then the seat under him. “Head between your knees,” Hugh’s voice was firm his hands steady. “Back with us?” 

“Yes,” Gabriel managed. “Sorry. Jess?” He tried to sit up, but there was still a firm hand of the back of his neck.

“Stay down,” Hugh instructed. “Jess is fine. She had a febrile seizure because her temperature rose too quickly, it’s quite common in children her age. She’s absolutely fine and you did the right thing.”

“Sorry.” 

“When did you last eat?” 

“I…” he thought about lying but couldn’t bring himself to do it. “I had some juice this morning.”

“You know when we tell someone where the kitchen is, it’s usually considered an invitation to use it.” Paul said dryly. 

“Captain?” Hell, now he seemed to have scared Daisy. 

“It’s Admiral now sweet-pea,” Hugh corrected “and he’s fine he just hasn’t given his body enough fuel to run on.”

“No,” she said seriously, “this is Captain, they can’t makes him a different name!” Gabriel snorted with laughter and suddenly there was something else bubbling up in his chest he clamped down on it hard.

“Right,” Hugh said gently. “Let’s get everyone back home. Slowly,” he instructed, as Gabriel sat up. 

“Sorry, I’m fine now you get away.” 

“If you think Hugh is about to let you wander off into the night…” Paul said pointedly. “Daisy-chain, you come with me and Jess and we’ll get a transport to take us home.”

“It’s been a big adventure,” Daisy said as she walked with her Papa out the door. “Do you know what I think? I think some chocolate ice-cream would make Captain and Jess feel better.” 

“You really can’t be left to your own devices can you?” the doctor said, as he helped Gabriel stand up with a hand beneath his elbow as the followed the others out of the emergency care unit.

“This new posting… I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have agreed to look after them, I obviously wasn’t…”

 

“Enough. I’m going to say this one last time, she’s fine, it happens and you did the right thing. You should have said no, but that’s because you’re obviously exhausted and what you should have been doing was having actual food and an early night.”

“I…”

“No, not interest Gabriel. You’re going to come back and I’m going to feed you and then you’re going to sleep in the spare room until lunch time. Don’t make me turn it into an official order. Apart from anything else,” he added much more gently, “you’ve had a shock this evening.”

“Good timing,” Paul said as they stepped outside. “That’s it Daisy, you sit next to me. And Gabriel would you take this madame while I fasten seatbelts.” Paul handed him a sleepy but happy Jess and Gabriel froze for a moment

“Cap’in,” she murmured contently, wriggling until she was happy, her reassuringly cool forehead tucked beneath his chin.

_____

It hadn’t been Paul’s most subtle work but it had been entirely successful. By the time that they made it back home, Daisy was fast asleep and Jess was at the ragdoll stage. 

“I’ll take this one straight upstairs,” Paul whispered, picking up their eldest and carrying her back to bed.

“Gabriel, I think we’ll keep Jess down here just now. Would you just hang on to her? Go on through to the living room and get comfortable while I sort out some food. We didn’t get to dinner either so we’ll all need to eat.”

Paul stuck his head into the kitchen a few minutes later, Gabriel’s uniform jacket held in his hand. 

“I had to wrestle this off of her, “ he said holding up the much coveted garment. “You need to come and see this though,” he finished with a restrained mirth that Hugh loved to see. He put down the jug he’d been holding and followed his husband through to the other room. Lying flat out on the sofa, one arm tucked behind his head and the other wrapped carefully around their daughter who was sprawled across his chest, Starfleet’s newest admiral was also fast asleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, as ever I'd love to hear your thoughts here or on Twitter @LHA_again  
> Lx


End file.
